Advice please - car insurance claim against us

NickyBo_2

Hi,
I'm having a problem with an car insurance claim against my husband and I was hoping for some advice.

A couple of weeks ago we were doing a bit of shopping in a local retail park. When we get back to the car someone had parked rather close to us. As dh was putting our son into his car seat our car door slightly knocked against their door. It didn't hit out, bang it or anything like that, it barely touched it. Yet suddenly the owners appeared and were going on about this dent and scratch that our door had caused! The car was absolutely full of dents and scratches! I might believe that our door had caused a TINY 3mm long scratch as it was in the place where our door had touched there's, but there was absolutely no dent as the man kept trying to claim. It just wasn't there. They were so insistant and wrote down our reg plate so dh had to give them our address. I'm fuming about that, I feel like it was a right set up. We have no problem paying for the little scratch to be sorted as it was miniscule and dh could probably fix it himself!

However, we have just had a phonecall from our insurance company saying that they've been informed (by the other man's insurance company) of a COLLISION we had with them :eek:! Dh told them exactly what had happened and they are going to 'look into it'. He then phoned the other man's insurance company to ask what was happening and they said that there garage had looked at the car and it was going to cost £500+ to fix!! HELP!! At the most we caused a tiny scratch, there was no dent at all other than the dozen others around his car nowhere near where we were.

What can we do? I really think he's trying it on. I suspect either he is claiming for more than the one little scratch or the garage is trying it on. Personally I think it's the car owner as when it happened he started going on about a dent (that we could not see at all!).

Any advice is hugely appreciated as I've never had to deal with anything like this before. Where do we stand legally and how can we fight this?

Thank you.

DarkConvict

Just see what the insurance company has to say, if you say you didn't dent it, and they say you did. Do they have any proof? Any other witnesses etc. If not i can't see they can do anything as its his word against yours. And as can be seen by his car it was already badly damaged, so you have no caused as deterrent to the vehicle.

iamana1ias

NickyBo wrote: »

Any advice is hugely appreciated

The insurance board is 19 above this one

tandraig

let the insurance company sort it out hun. you just keep to the facts when asked what happened.
sounds like the other party are scamming you if it was just a little door bump. keep calm and keep denying responsibility if you genuinely feel that you didnt cause the damage.

Apricot

The insurance company won't fight this it has happened to a friend of mine. Basically she told her insurance what happened and they said it would cost them so much money to prove that it wasn't her fault, it was cheaper for them to just accept the claim and pay out. She lost her no claims bonus but there was nothing they would do.

It's a crap system and is why so many people take advantage of it.

Dave101t

just deny everything, typical con. kick your door and say they did it.

NattyVee

You say the incident happened in a car park. Is it possible to ask for footage from the car park owners of CCTV if they have it?

Crapgame

Contact your insurer and see what their intentions are or likely to be. Tell them you caused no damage, and there is no evidence to suggest you did. Tell both insurance companies you believe he is trying a false claim and you do not intend to help him do that. The insurers should check the guys details and see if he has any other claims. Carefully check any and all insurance policies you have, you may have a bolt on £10000 (or whatever) of legal cover. If you have that, use it.
Try to find out if the garage giving the quote is 'authorised' by your insurers. Insist on more than one quote if it comes down to it. Examine any quotes to see exactly what work they intend to do. See if you can get a copy of exactly what he has put in writing to his/your insurance company.
If you are an AA/RAC/Motoring Organisation member, or in a Trade Union, see how much help you can get from them.
Be prepared to fight all the way - especially if your insurance company try to take the lazy way out and just accept this man at his word. They shouldn't do. They should be looking for evidence from him, but it might be down to you to question everything.
Curiously, it looks like the £500 claim is around the average 'excess'. Perhaps you were supposed to settle without involving insurance? You know, so you don't lose your no claims discount?
I would contact the police local to where the incident took place. They won't be very interested in doing anything, but ask them to record your call and give you a reference number. Tell them you believe an attempt fraud is taking place, they are obliged to take the details, even if they do nothing else. At least then the old bill will have details of this man and his car, and hopefully will get on his case if he makes his living this way. (There was some foreign bloke got some serious jail time recently for false claims)

gordikin

Thank you Crapgame your post made me smile. OP put all info in the hands of your Insurer and let them deal with it. It's what you are paying them for.... and don't stress!

marleyboy

Try not to stress yourself out over this, stick to your guns, deny all knowledge of "dents", whatever you do do not admit to anything, even a 3mm scratch - that will be enough for any insurance company to state you admit liability.

pendulum

As you have admitted your door touched his car then your insurance company is very likely to pay out. Getting the CCTV will be of no benefit to you as it will just show your door hitting his car and then an argument ensuing. It would actually be worse for you.

The advice about wasting police time to report a fraud is joke advice. It's the same as the other guy going to police to report you for criminal damage. You just have different opinions of what level of damage was caused by the door knock. Just let the insurance companies do their thing and brace yourself to lose some NCB, and be more careful next time when opening doors.